What’s your art?

I was finishing up Seth Godin’s Linchpin this weekend while camping in Plains for a swim meet and thought this was worthy of sharing.

Like others have said, there’s a lot in Linchpin that is common knowledge/attitude to “smart people” and while it resonates with how I feel about business and opportunity (likewise, Dan Kennedy would be nodding his head saying “I’ve been saying this for years!”), it never hurts to refresh those thoughts with words from someone who comes from another angle.

Dan and Seth both present their case on the “being indispensable” thing with a substantially different tone, so it’s helpful to hear it from a fresh angle.

Your art

One thing stuck out from Seth’s version as I got toward the end.

He started discussing your “what you do best” work as your art. I was mentally nodding “yep, yep, yep” and then he really hit the nail on the head.

He said something along the lines of “Your art is that thing you do that no one can tell you how to do“. Why? Because it’s your passion and skill for that work is perhaps not untouchable, but highly developed when compared to almost everyone around you.

My art

For me, it’s the integration of marketing, technology and business process refinement and how they flow to the bottom line. I can talk on stage (or elsewhere) about those things all day long – even if no one is listening.

For example, the programmer and industrial engineering side of my head is what focuses me on the “bugs” in your process (such as the “patient intake” experience I described after my doctor visit last week). When you marry that to the marketing and customer service side of things, it’s easy to see ROI.

I’d like to hear what your art is and how you’re leveraging it to help others.